Scientific Dishonesty

[Fisherking]

Philosophy could be said to have reached a temporary impasse, much as medical science did up until germ theory and refinements in other fields.

Science, on the other hand, is playing fast and loose with ethics and strictest adherence to the philosophy of science. Without that philosophical grounding we only have charlatans working pretend science to defraud the public and their pretended infallibility.

[HopAlongBunny]

Philosophy, Science, Philosophy of Science.
Like everything in society there are interesting only so far as their relationship to power.
A tautology perhaps, insofar as everything has meaning in consequence of its relationship to the power dynamic within a society.
"Follow the Money!"; sure but that only gets you so far; what about the silence, what about the exclusions, what about the masks that say one thing and do another.
The term Science, like any puppet show, hides as much as it reveals...

[Tuuvi]

These are very gross generalizations. I would say they are applicable to nonsense fields (I don't mean to offend anyone, but that's how I see it and I like to speak plainly) like psychology or social "sciences".

Why do you think the social sciences are nonsense fields?

[Gilrandir]

Philosophy could be said to have reached a temporary impasse, much as medical science did up until germ theory and refinements in other fields.

Philosophy never left that impasse.

Any science is developing by way of changing paradigms. A paradigm consists of a problem/question scientists confront, a hypothesis (a preliminary answer to this question) and the verification of the hypothesis (encompassing data and methods) which brings some results. The paradigm changes when either the question or the hypothesis changes. For example, in astronomy the first hypothesis was that the sun circles the earth, later it was changed into the modern one (the earth circles the sun).

Now philosophy from the very outset posed one question (what is primary - the mind or the matter) and offered two evident preliminary answers which have been in the state of verification ever since, yielding no results. Generations of philosophers joined this or that point of view being unable to prove it with their opponents being unable to prove the opposite. So it it is not a temporary impasse, it is embalmed lethargy or fossilization. Pick one to your liking.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Philosophy killed logical positivism for good in the late 20th century. Progress is slow but it happens.

[Husar]

Now philosophy from the very outset posed one question (what is primary - the mind or the matter) and offered two evident preliminary answers which have been in the state of verification ever since, yielding no results. Generations of philosophers joined this or that point of view being unable to prove it with their opponents being unable to prove the opposite. So it it is not a temporary impasse, it is embalmed lethargy or fossilization. Pick one to your liking.

Physics and medicine also still do not have answers to their founding questions of how does the world work and how to make people live forever (or how to make them healthy again).

Your view is overly simplistic and makes little sense. Most sciences were spawned by philosophical questions, how can you then say that sciences achieved a lot and philosophy is not yielding results?

[Gilrandir]

Physics and medicine also still do not have answers to their founding questions of how does the world work and how to make people live forever (or how to make them healthy again).

As for physics, the question of how the world works is too general. It is specified in the branches of physics (statics, dynamics, electricity, thermodynamics, quantum physics and so on). Each of them can boast of some results, i.e. laws that were discovered by scientists (Ohm's law, Joule Lenz law, Boyle Mariotte law, Newton laws, Faraday's law etc.). What about philosophy? Any laws to boast of? "All things come to pass, so no man ever steps in the same river twice"? One surely has to be a hell of a scientist to make such a conclusion.
The problem with philosophy is in asking too general questions and making too general conclusions. Such questions can't be answered and such conclusions don't require preliminary training, being an old and wise man will suffice.

As for medicine, compare its current achievements with those of the time of, say, Ibn Sina, and compare the "achievements" of philosophy of corresponding epochs.

Most sciences were spawned by philosophical questions, how can you then say that sciences achieved a lot and philosophy is not yielding results?

So the only achievemnet of philosophy is in begetting all sciences? Then we should probably speak of philosophy as the first stage of all sciences' development. When special sciences stemmed from philosophy, the latter has fulfilled its purpose and has run its course. By now it "is tired and needs a nap".

Your view is overly simplistic and makes little sense.

I offered arguments to support my view (which, i.e. arguments, you so far failed to refute), you offer a description of my view. Discussions don't work in this way.

[Husar]

As for physics, the question of how the world works is too general. It is specified in the branches of physics (statics, dynamics, electricity, thermodynamics, quantum physics and so on). Each of them can boast of some results, i.e. laws that were discovered by scientists (Ohm's law, Joule Lenz law, Boyle Mariotte law, Newton laws, Faraday's law etc.). What about philosophy? Any laws to boast of? "All things come to pass, so no man ever steps in the same river twice"? One surely has to be a hell of a scientist to make such a conclusion.
The problem with philosophy is in asking too general questions and making too general conclusions. Such questions can't be answered and such conclusions don't require preliminary training, being an old and wise man will suffice.

As for medicine, compare its current achievements with those of the time of, say, Ibn Sina, and compare the "achievements" of philosophy of corresponding epochs.

Oh, it was too general? You mean just like your view of philosophy? Why does something have to produce a law in order to be useful? Are lawmakers and dictators the most useful people on earth? You seem to be stuck in wanting results, but as the great philosopher Confucius said, "the way is the goal"...

So the only achievemnet of philosophy is in begetting all sciences? Then we should probably speak of philosophy as the first stage of all sciences' development. When special sciences stemmed from philosophy, the latter has fulfilled its purpose and has run its course. By now it "is tired and needs a nap".

You are entitled to that opinion, but in my opinion you fundamentally miss the "purpose" of philosophy. The purpose of philosophy lies in the name itself, in a way that is a very personal thing and just because you may think wisdom is not needed anymore now that we have data and information everywhere that does not mean everyone has to agree.

I offered arguments to support my view (which, i.e. arguments, you so far failed to refute), you offer a description of my view. Discussions don't work in this way.

That's your philosophy, I have a different one which is superior.
As for your agrguments, you have proven none of them so they're purely philosophical and therefore do not provide an answer according to you.

I would say the lower significance of philosophy today, if it is even lower at all, is due to the changes in society, but then again people already said 2500 years ago that philosophers were all crazy and the thing still stuck around. Therefore I see little need to engage your arguments as history may just repeat itself anyway.

[Gilrandir]

Oh, it was too general? You mean just like your view of philosophy?

My generalization is prompted by the very nature of philosophy - the most general "science" aspiring to discover most general laws. One can't be specific about it unlike physics or medicine.

Why does something have to produce a law in order to be useful? Are lawmakers and dictators the most useful people on earth?

According to you it seems that philosophers are. And laws are just a sample of what a science produces. More important, though, is the production of discoveries and inventions. Philosophy didn't produce either.

You seem to be stuck in wanting results, but as the great philosopher Confucius said, "the way is the goal"...
You are entitled to that opinion, but in my opinion you fundamentally miss the "purpose" of philosophy. The purpose of philosophy lies in the name itself,

I see. Art for art's sake.
- Why do you need a car?
- Just to have it.
- But you never drive it!
- The use of the car is in having one.

you may think wisdom is not needed anymore now that we have data and information everywhere that does not mean everyone has to agree.

I believe that wisdom is still in great demand, but it is born by life experience. Idle theoretization aka philosophy is but the ape of wisdom.

That's your philosophy, I have a different one which is superior.

A very wise approach - to pronounce a different opinion inferior. Shows a philosopher at once.

As for your agrguments, you have proven none of them so they're purely philosophical and therefore do not provide an answer according to you.

My argument (which I repeat for the third time) is the premise of the abscence of any palpable results of philosophical studies in 2500 years. I challenged anyone to refute it. You couldn't provide any facts that my opinion is wrong. You just pronounce it simplistic, senseless and inferior. A very philosophical dodge.

I would say the lower significance of philosophy today, if it is even lower at all, is due to the changes in society

You mean like no one uses VCRs or beepers any more? So, again, philosophy has fulfilled its purpose by raising some questions and defaulting on answering them. Let it rest in peace. Amen.

[rory_20_uk]

Physics and medicine also still do not have answers to their founding questions of how does the world work and how to make people live forever (or how to make them healthy again).

Your view is overly simplistic and makes little sense. Most sciences were spawned by philosophical questions, how can you then say that sciences achieved a lot and philosophy is not yielding results?

Medicine is based on making people better - it was never started on philosophy, but on tribal healers. Medicine continues to have an iterative approach rather than worry about people living for ever.

[Fisherking]

As for physics, the question of how the world works is too general. It is specified in the branches of physics (statics, dynamics, electricity, thermodynamics, quantum physics and so on). Each of them can boast of some results, i.e. laws that were discovered by scientists (Ohm's law, Joule Lenz law, Boyle Mariotte law, Newton laws, Faraday's law etc.). What about philosophy? Any laws to boast of? "All things come to pass, so no man ever steps in the same river twice"? One surely has to be a hell of a scientist to make such a conclusion.
The problem with philosophy is in asking too general questions and making too general conclusions. Such questions can't be answered and such conclusions don't require preliminary training, being an old and wise man will suffice.

As for medicine, compare its current achievements with those of the time of, say, Ibn Sina, and compare the "achievements" of philosophy of corresponding epochs.



So the only achievemnet of philosophy is in begetting all sciences? Then we should probably speak of philosophy as the first stage of all sciences' development. When special sciences stemmed from philosophy, the latter has fulfilled its purpose and has run its course. By now it "is tired and needs a nap".


I offered arguments to support my view (which, i.e. arguments, you so far failed to refute), you offer a description of my view. Discussions don't work in this way.

Philosophy is the study of the general and fundamental nature of reality, existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language.

It too has many branches. Each of your cited discoveries owe as much to philosophy as to any other branch of study.

Philosophy has only given us logic, reason, ethics, scientific methodology, all political persuasions, and all areas of study.

Those who say philosophy is useless have obviously failed in their critical thinking, in the same way a student fails when he says he has no possible use for algebra as it has no use in the real world.

Unknowingly they have adopted a personal philosophy lacking in judgement and reason.

[Montmorency]

I'll reprint part of a relevant piece that basically organizes the confusion of the various perspectives presented here:

The ‘Death of Philosophy’ is something that circulates through arterial underbelly of culture with quite some regularity, a theme periodically goosed whenever high-profile scientific figures bother to express their attitudes on the subject. Scholars in the humanities react the same way stakeholders in any institution react when their authority and privilege are called into question: they muster rationalizations, counterarguments, and pejoratives. They rally troops with whooping war-cries of “positivism” or “scientism,” list all the fields of inquiry where science holds no sway, and within short order the whole question of whether philosophy is dead begins to look very philosophical, and the debate itself becomes evidence that philosophy is alive and well—in some respects at least.

The problem with this pattern, of course, is that the terms like ‘philosophy’ or ‘science’ are so overdetermined that no one ends up talking about the same thing. For physicists like Stephen Hawking or Lawrence Krauss or Neil deGrasse Tyson, the death of philosophy is obvious insofar as the institution has become almost entirely irrelevant to their debates. There are other debates, they understand, debates where scientists are the hapless ones, but they see the process of science as an inexorable, and yes, imperialistic one. More and more debates fall within its purview as the technical capacities of science improve. They presume the institution of philosophy will become irrelevant to more and more debates as this process continues. For them, philosophy has always been something to chase away. Since the presence of philosophers in a given domain of inquiry reliably indicates scientific ignorance to important features of that domain, the relevance of philosophers is directly related to the maturity of a science.

They have history on their side.

There will always be speculation—science is our only reliable provender of theoretical cognition, after all. The question of the death of philosophy cannot be the question of the death of theoretical speculation. The death of philosophy as I see it is the death of a particular institution, a discourse anchored in the tradition of using intentional idioms and metacognitive deliverances to provide theoretical solutions. I think science is killing that philosophy as we speak.

[Fisherking]

I'll reprint part of a relevant piece that basically organizes the confusion of the various perspectives presented here:

It's great. BUT They just don't understand irony.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Behold an unprovable (and therefore metaphysical) claim:

"science is our only reliable provender of theoretical cognition"

The author should have written

"science is our only currently available method of analysis of theoretical cognition"

Failure to understand the difference is the result of a lack of philosophical training - the inappropriate use of archaic words is just facile - provender is just an alternative for provider.

I'm sorry, but it was pitifully easy to kick the legs out from under that. The author is just engaging in philosophical masturbation, he's at least decades behind the argument.

[Montmorency]

The question of the death of philosophy cannot be the question of the death of theoretical speculation. The death of philosophy as I see it is the death of a particular institution, a discourse anchored in the tradition of using intentional idioms and metacognitive deliverances to provide theoretical solutions. I think science is killing that philosophy as we speak.

Would it kill you to read more than one sentence, PVC? And as a matter of fact, if he sounds "decades behind the argument" it is because he is a sort of neo-Nietzschean. Sadly for post-modernists and traditionalists alike, Nietzsche's use of metaphysics to destroy metaphysics has never been defeated - only disregarded.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Would it kill you to read more than one sentence, PVC? And as a matter of fact, if he sounds "decades behind the argument" it is because he is a sort of neo-Nietzschean. Sadly for post-modernists and traditionalists alike, Nietzsche's use of metaphysics to destroy metaphysics has never been defeated - only disregarded.

I read the whole thing - I only needed to quote one sentence to demonstrate how flawed his argument was.

Oh - incidentally that's insulting - and the sentence is near the end so I would have had to have read at least the entire preceding paragraphs.

This look over half an hour to write, so I expect a response of equal length:

Phille-Sophie

Love of Wisdom/Knowledge.

As I have repeatedly pointed out, in this thread and elsewhere over the last decade, what is today considered "philosophy" is actually a very small subset of philosophy concerned with Ethics and Metaphysics.

the writer is a Sophist, you can see that by the way he uses language. For example, "metacognitive" means "after thinking", it's a term that has been invented recently (I had to look it up) to describe the metaphysics of thought, and is supposed to mean "thinking about thinking" but that's not how he uses the term. He's using the term to mean "thinking about metaphysics" or thinking about metaphysical problems.

He's wrong on both ends because the question of how we know what we know is an important one to be aware of - and other metaphysical questions about the existence of the universe which extend from it are also important in ethics.

The person who wrote that peace is appealing to a system of thought that only encompasses enquiry of mechanical processes, i.e. Science.

Again I refer you to Ethics, Ethics is unlikely to be something which will "fall" to this "Imperialist" Science because it doesn't deal with quantifiable questions.

Look at his "argument" at the end.

You can boil it down to this paraphrase -

1. All thought processes are essentially the same, including self-reflective thought (meta congnition).

2. The mechanical structure of the world is largely inaccessible.

Here he's already made one redundant statement and one mistaken one - the mistake is to believe that the physical world's "mechanical structure" is accessible, it isn't. Moving on.

3. Cognition exploits systematic correlations—‘cues’—between those effects that can be accessed and the systems engaged to solve for those systems.

Errr.... Human being look for patterns. I confess I don't understand the second part "systems engaged to solve for those systems" I can't help but feel he's missed a clause here.

4. Cognition is heuristic.

​This simply means that humans solve problems by the most efficient method that achieves an answer, even if the answer is an approximation. Given that all our investigate methods are flawed this is another redundant statement. I think he's relating this to point three - which means that he's saying that human being look for patterns and then use the most expedient and efficiant method to explain those patterns.

So far so redundant.

5. Metacognition is the product of adventitious adaptations exploiting onboard information in various reproductively decisive ways.

OK, I think this is where he really lost me because Metacognition is self reflection. I suppose it has an advantage, evolutionarily speaking, it's the faculty that causes us to ask "If I'm this drunk is she really that hot or is the ale making he boobs look bigger". That being said this is not a provable statement, it's a side-swipe at organised religion and all self-reflective thought. He's attempting to reduce man's self reflection and his curiosity to a mechanical evolutionary advantage. That may be true, but you can't prove it.

so the argument falls here also.

6. The applicability of that ancestral information to second order questions regarding the nature of experience is highly unlikely.

​Self-reflection is not relevant to the question of the nature of experience. This is, remember, what "metacognition" actually mean - out self reflective ability. Any question of the "nature of experience" is necessarily purely self-reflective because it cannot be tested Scientifically. If I stop trusting my senses I cannot before any Scientific experiment where the results are read by sense.

You may argue that is not what he meant but that's his problem, he used these words in the formulation of his proof. Again, a lack of an understanding of metaphysics is the fault here.

7. The inability of intentionalism to agree on formulations, let alone resolve issues, evidences as much.

He has lost me completely - I need an explanation of "Intentionalism" as it relates to philosophy and metaphysics as opposed to literary criticism. In literature "Intentionalism" means that Shakespeare wrote Richard the III as a villain and therefore he should be read as one.

Leaving that aside though, the argument is full mangled words being all bent out of shape to conceal what I would say is a lack of an actual argument.

That's fine, it's in the best tradition of Sophistic arguments on Metaphysics but that doesn't change the fact that Protagoras killed Metaphysics with a single sentence over two and a half millenai ago and all we do now if pick over the corpse.

The sentence was "Man is the measure of all things, of things that are, that they are, of things that are not, that they are not."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protagoras

The point, essentially, is that human experience is universally variable and Science has been able to demonstrate evidence of this - we do not even perceive colours in the same way.

[Gilrandir]

Philosophy is the study of the general and fundamental nature of reality, existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language.

I like it!!!! Colors do enliven this too vague and abstract a thread.

It too has many branches. Each of your cited discoveries owe as much to philosophy as to any other branch of study.

Philosophy has only given us logic, reason, ethics, scientific methodology, all political persuasions, and all areas of study.

This is what I have said. The beginnings of theoretical thought aiming to answer the most general question "What is the world and what is the place of the human in it?" were called philosophy. It was an umbrella science and all scientists of that time were philosophers. When more specific questions about the world and the human were asked a number of specialized sciences branched from philosophy. They dug deeper and deeper into the nature of the objects they studied while philosophy, bereft of the applicability which was relegated to the offspring, was left with the initial question which it failed to answer, it being too general and vague. So it is now but an embalmed corpse whose past gave prodigious progeny and was therefore glorious but whose present is just pondering on the old glory.

Those who say philosophy is useless have obviously failed in their critical thinking, in the same way a student fails when he says he has no possible use for algebra as it has no use in the real world.

Unknowingly they have adopted a personal philosophy lacking in judgement and reason.

Modern scientists get paid for:
1) doing research;
2) teaching their science.
Roughly speaking, a modern physicist discovers something in his lab, comes into the classroom and says: "Faraday said it was impossible, but look what I have done".
If modern philosophers can teach about the glory of the past, what research can they be doing? Will they discover anything new? They are only able to say: "Plato said it was impossible. Could be, or could be not".

So in my view, one studies philosophy to get to know what others claimed (without being able to prove or refute anything) and see how abstact human thought can be. To broaden one's outlook and enrich one's knowledge. The only use I can see in it.

As for the uselessness of algebra - ALL sciences may appear useful or useless depending on one's future plans. It is useless for a high school student who is going to be a linguist, but is useful for the one whose future major is physics or chemistry.

[Montmorency]

the writer is a Sophist, you can see that by the way he uses language. For example, "metacognitive" means "after thinking", it's a term that has been invented recently (I had to look it up) to describe the metaphysics of thought, and is supposed to mean "thinking about thinking" but that's not how he uses the term. He's using the term to mean "thinking about metaphysics" or thinking about metaphysical problems.

No, he does not. He uses it in the cognitive science sense, namely 'the cognition of cognition'. While for you that may sound like 'thinking about thinking', the author simply identifies metacognition as being the cognition taking itself as sensory input, to produce among other things the "experience" of consciousness.

He's wrong on both ends because the question of how we know what we know is an important one to be aware of - and other metaphysical questions about the existence of the universe which extend from it are also important in ethics.

The person who wrote that peace is appealing to a system of thought that only encompasses enquiry of mechanical processes, i.e. Science.

Again I refer you to Ethics, Ethics is unlikely to be something which will "fall" to this "Imperialist" Science because it doesn't deal with quantifiable questions.

You haven't even begun to grasp his position, so you complain that you can't understand the words that the author uses and from there circle around your self-regard to conclude that this must all be sophistry. Ethics is precisely what will be eliminated, and not because science will provide an alternative, but because science will obviate the human premises and conditions that give rise to it. His argument is strongly predicated around the very epistemological question you name.

Here's something you can read about "intention".

I'll help out by annotating the author's points (note however that these points refer to his broader theses and not to the linked article per se):

1) Human cognition only has access to the effects of the systems cognized.

In other words, we do not know how we know, but more specifically in the beginning we do not sense processes as such but rather disconnected 'pings'.

2) The mechanical structure of our environments is largely inaccessible.

He isn't talking about science, but what you might call "perception" and the "mental" construction of etiologies. If, per the previous point, we only sense isolated effects, then the mechanics (tantamount to causality) of environments is sensed not at all or negligibly.

3) Cognition exploits systematic correlations—‘cues’—between those effects that can be accessed and the systems engaged to solve for those systems.

Sensory information is integrated to form causal judgements.

4) Cognition is heuristic.

There is signal attenuation; causal judgment is frugal in formulation.

5) Metacognition is a form of cognition.

6) Metacognition also exploits systematic correlations—‘cues’—between those effects that can be accessed and the systems engaged to solve for those systems.

7) Metacognition is also heuristic.

(1)-(4) applied to metacognition, in the sense that where cognition "solves" for environmental (i.e. non-nervous) systems, metacognition "solves" for cognitive (i.e. nervous) systems.

8) Metacognition is the product of adventitious adaptations exploiting onboard information in various reproductively decisive ways.

9) The applicability of that ancestral information to second order questions regarding the nature of experience is highly unlikely.

If cognition cannot "answer a question regarding the nature of experience", then how could metacognition (which intrinsically has less information to go off of)?

10) The inability of intentionalism to agree on formulations, let alone resolve issues, evidences as much.

See: Protagoras.

11) Intentional cognition is a form of cognition.

12) Intentional cognition also exploits systematic correlations—‘cues’—between those effects that can be accessed and the systems engaged to solve for those systems.

13) Intentional cognition is also heuristic.

14) Intentional cognition is the product of adventitious adaptations exploiting available onboard information in various reproductively decisive ways.

15) The applicability of that ancestral information to second order questions regarding the nature of meaning is highly unlikely.

16) The inability of intentionalism to agree on formulations, let alone resolve issues, evidences as much.

Getting clearer?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

No, not at all.

It's entirely possible that my own philosophical lens is so far out of line with his that I simply can't make the imaginative leap to be able to understand his point, or I may lack the empathy necessary to make the leap.

The philosophical grounding for Ethics was eliminated millennia ago - the only arguments for Ethics today are "faith" and "benefit".

On the one hand you have the argument that God is Good etc. On the other hand you have the argument that an ethical system is the one that produces the most benefit for the greatest number of people.

Intellectually I don't think either argument holds up - on the one hand you don't know what God wants from you and on the other it's very difficult to find a "benefit" that is generally applicable.

The way you explain it makes it look like a complicated way of saying "I know I know nothing".

In any case I maintain he is engaging in Sophisty when he uses words like "provender" instead of "source".

Perhaps an example would help.

Sticking with Ethics for the moment - how will Science make it irrelevant?

[Montmorency]

I've gone into the broader topic of this author's philosophy before here and between his writing and my elaborations most people gave up pretty fast.

To make it narrow and simple for

how will Science make it irrelevant?

By his thesis of a "Semantic Apocalypse", science will increasingly discredit human self-understanding, while producing the technology able to fundamentally alter or replace the physiological processes that lead us into this discussion, while fostering economic and political conditions in which such technology become widespread and the Anthropic Principle brought to obsolescence. If I had to write a mock-tagline for a movie, I might say:

THE DIALECTICAL DIALECTIC OF THE POSTHUMAN

In the beginning, there was nothing new under the sun. In the end, there will be nothing old.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Ah, Hell.

Not a fan - and I don't call it "Hell" to be flippant either.

I also don't think it's possible - the post-human utopia is just that, it's not human and it's not anywhere you'll ever find on a map.

I also don't see why this would be desirable.

I could write more but you might as well just read "Brave New World" or "Forever Free".

[Montmorency]

No no no, the point is not a specific social or political outcome, but a passing of Human civilization and experience.

Here:

The highest species concept may be that of a terrestrial rational being; however, we shall not be able to name its character because we have no knowledge of non-terrestrial rational beings that would enable us to indicate their characteristic property and so to characterize this terrestrial being among rational beings in general. It seems, therefore, that the problem of indicating the character of the human species is absolutely insoluble, because the solution would have to be made through experience by means of the comparison of two species of rational being, but experience does not offer us this. (Kant: Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View, 225)

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

You think the End of Humanity isn't Hell?

A rather obvious answer to his question would be the way we treat Whales, we're fairly certain they're sentient but we still kill and eat them. It's unlikely we'll even recognise or acknowledge alien sentience if we encounter it unless it's so similar to our own that it doesn't fundamentally challenge our modes of thought.

[HopAlongBunny]

You think the End of Humanity isn't Hell?

A rather obvious answer to his question would be the way we treat Whales, we're fairly certain they're sentient but we still kill and eat them. It's unlikely we'll even recognise or acknowledge alien sentience if we encounter it unless it's so similar to our own that it doesn't fundamentally challenge our modes of thought.

Nice but you didn't go far enough. Whales? Why not just the poor. To be excluded from ethical thought (in a practical not abstract context) it is enough that we do not belong to the same "tribe" within society.
I think Nietzsche had something to say on this point.

[a completely inoffensive name]

The beauty of philosophy is partly because of seemingly intractable questions.

It's a constant exercise in assessing the limitations of our knowledge and the assumptions we use when we make value judgments.

This pop-sci "IT WORKS BITCHES" garbage is going to self detonate eventually and real science will unfairly be caught in the cross-fire.

[Greyblades]

The things discussed in this thread both confuse and scare me.

[Gilrandir]

As for the uselessness of algebra - ALL sciences may appear useful or useless depending on one's future plans. It is useless for a high school student who is going to be a linguist, but is useful for the one whose future major is physics or chemistry.

I would like to take my words on the useleseness of mathematics back:
http://www.popularmechanics.com/tech...y-slice-pizza/